Something Tender
by Unoriginality
Summary: One last meeting between Steve and Peggy.


It had been seventy years.

While he was sleeping in ice, never aging, Peggy had lived on. Her record said she retired immediately after the Hydra plane went down. The government kept an eye on her; she had sensitive information locked in her mind, after all. She'd married, had three kids, eight grandchildren, and by now, she had three great-grandchildren. She lived in Sunny Grove nursing home up in upper New York state, nearing her hundred year mark. She was still sharp as a tack, according to her children, which is why the government still watched her. She was growing frail, though, arthritis making it impossible for her to live alone and her husband had died a couple decades back, and with the kids having their own lives, they couldn't live with her to take care of her.

All this information made Steve feel incredibly old. His 'right partner' from his days as a young man, fresh into the military and helping his country, was a woman in her mid nineties with grandchildren. Not just grandchildren, igreat/i-grandchildren. His time in ice had made the years pass by him, and nothing from the old days was the same. New York was pure insanity now, cars went speeds up of a hundred and technology had taken over completely. It was beyond him.

He wanted something from the old days.

He wanted Peggy.

But she was beyond him now, his age eternally stuck at about twenty years, despite the fact that he was also somewhere around ninety. He'd forgotten to count. She would pass away soon, god, she was amazing to have made it this long. She'd seen wars he'd slept through- Korea, Vietnam, and god, the stories he'd heard about that bungled mess made him almost as ashamed of his country as those cities in Japan had. The military had changed, too, and not for the better.

His name had been in papers when he was found. An amazing find, a perfectly preserved Captain America, the American hero that saved the entire Eastern seaboard, if not the country, if not the world, by defeating Hyrda. And the last few months, he'd been hiding from the publicity, locking himself in his quarters and the gym, taking out his frustration on defenseless punching bags. He was going through them pretty fast.

But it was time to stop hiding, at least from her. Time may have passed them by, but he still wanted to see her.

So he annoyed Colonel Fury into getting him an old-fashioned motorcycle and giving him the leave to go visit. Steve was sure SHIELD had bugs on him somehow, watching him for variations in his proposed path that might make him a liability.

He considered stopping by Xavier's School just to tweak them, but decided against it.

Millica, New York was a small and peaceful New England town, with quaint street names such as Maple Grove Drive and Seqoia Road. Sunny Grove was on Briarwood Lane, tucked in at the end of the street, surrounded by trees and flowers and walking paths. A beautiful place to go to die.

With a sigh, Steve parked his motorcycle and went in, looking around the main room for signs of Peggy, not that he thought he'd recognize her at her age.

"Can I help you?" a CNA asked, approaching him from the nurse's station.

"Uh, yeah," he said, glancing around again before focusing his attention on the young woman in scrubs. "Peggy Hempstead? Is she- where can I find her?"

"Oh, she's in her room. Are you family?"

"No, a friend. From a lot longer ago than I probably look," he said, somewhat wryly.

The CNA smiled. "Steve Rogers, right? She's been waiting for you. This way."

Why did that not surprise him? He followed the petite little CNA down a hall to a series of comfortably-sized sunny rooms. She stopped and knocked on the frame of an open door. "Missus Hempstead? Someone's here to see you."

The frail-looking woman in the chair by the window didn't move. "All right, Jenny, let them in."

Steve could still hear traces of the strong, beautiful voice that had been the last thing he'd heard before he'd crashed when Peggy spoke. Jenny smiled at Steve. "Go on in," she said, stepping back into the hall and heading back to the front area.

Before Steve could even clear his throat to announce his presence, Peggy turned to look at him. "You're late," she said with a warm, small smile on her face.

He looked down at the ground, smiling at the memory. "Yeah, I couldn't call my ride."

She motioned him in as she stood up from her chair slowly. "I saw the papers. You're still America's hero, I see."

He shook his head, walking in and standing in front of her, his hands in his pockets for lack of better places to put them. "Naw, I'm just a scientific discovery, as I've always been. Hell, I can get beat up again, some of these mutant folks walking around."

"You're still America's hero, though," she said. "You were the first of the superheroes. There's others now, Xavier's X-Men, Spiderman, Daredevil. They're all following your lead. Saving people, protecting the citizens. Fighting the good fight. You started that."

"No, Peggy," he said, shaking his head. "I'm not the first hero this country has seen. I'm just the first one that didn't get his strength the old fashioned way." Then he smiled. "But how have you been? Really? I hear you've got three great-grandkids now. Big family."

She smiled, looking out her window. "Hank and I always loved having such a big family at Christmas to buy for. Money wasn't tight, we could afford to spoil or children. I wish I could flatter you by telling you I named one of my children after you, but my heart couldn't handle that."

Steve put a hand on her shoulder. "I never expected you to, Peggy. Hank. Was he your right partner?"

There was a distant look in her eyes before her smile dimmed. "He was. My second one. My first one was lost somewhere over the Eastern seaboard, locked in ice. I had to look for someone new to dance with."

"And now he's gone," he said carefully, not wanting to upset her.

One corner of her lips quirked upwards. "Yes, he is. It's been awhile since I've been dancing."

Steve was quiet a moment, then held his hand out to her. "Mind if your first right partner asks you for that dance we agreed on?"

She looked over at him, wide-eyed, then her face lit up with a broad smile that was still dazzling for all her years. She put her frail, arthritis-stricken hand in his. "I've been waiting."

Her arthritis and hip- recovering from a fall early in the month- demanded they couldn't do more than hold each other and sway slightly with music only they heard. But Steve held her hand gently, his hand resting lightly on her waist as they danced. Peggy gripped his hand as tightly as she could, which wasn't much, but he could tell she put all her strength into it. She rested her chin on his shoulder at first, then buried it against his neck. His shirt collar started to feel wet as her shoulders began to shake.

"Peggy?" He grew concerned, pulling back to look at her.

She looked up at him with tears in her eyes, making them bright in the lights. "I have waited almost seventy years for this, and now that it's here, I can barely move to enjoy it."

He reached up and pet back her silver hair. "It's okay, Peggy. I'm sorry I'm late."

"You should be," she scolded, reluctantly letting go of him to sit back down again with a groan of effort. "I've been waiting."

Steve crouched in front of her, a hand resting on her leg, not for balance, but for comfort. "Yeah, so have I."

Peggy smiled down at him, putting her hand on his. "I've missed you. I did love you."

He could feel himself flush a bit. "I never stopped loving you."

She closed her eyes, sighing.

And went still.

After a few more minutes, he withdrew his hand and stepped out into the hall. He flagged down a nurse. "You should check on her," he said quietly, then made his way out of the nursing home, and said goodbye to the last of an old world he'd loved so much.


End file.
